


A Very Phantomhive Valentine's Day

by 23Murasaki



Series: Everyone Lives! [23]
Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Friendship Letters, Gen, Humans Are Weird, Love Letters, Team Phantomhive Adventures, Valentine's Day, bultering is also difficult, demoning is difficult, everything is platonic, is that a thing?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-02
Updated: 2014-03-02
Packaged: 2018-01-14 08:22:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1259497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/23Murasaki/pseuds/23Murasaki
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There is absolutely no reason for Ciel and Sebastian to condone the celebration of a holiday about romance named after a saint. Somehow the letters start showing up anyway. What's a demon to do?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Very Phantomhive Valentine's Day

“It is a perfectly idiotic tradition,” said the demon’s young master huffily, folding his arms across his chest and glaring at the entirely innocent slice of cake sitting before him. The demon himself was torn between agreeing that a holiday named after a saint and celebrating things like love and relationships was utterly foolish, and throwing his support behind anything that drove his young master up the wall.  
  
“Lady Elizabeth is sure to enjoy it,” he replied, deciding on a happy medium. His young master glared harder, and stabbed the red velvet cake with a violence befitting more dramatic surroundings.  
  
“I know,” he snapped. “Don’t let her put up paper hearts anywhere. That’s an order.” The demon really disliked holiday-specific orders.  
  
\----  
  
The paper hearts were obediently dealt with, but the streamers he could do little about, least of all once Prince Soma got involved and somehow attached pink paper elephants to strange places. Agni offered no explanation beyond something muttered about prosperity and the goddess Parvati. That didn’t help. Lady Elizabeth liked the elephants. That possibly made everything worse. Meirin, completely straight-faced, managed to dye the milk pink. The demon fought the urge to dump it out on her head and them march out the door. When the laundry turned out pink as well, however, he deposited the ruined sheets on Agni in a fit of despair and and locked himself in his room for half an hour. Agni returned the sheets perfectly white, possibly whiter than they had been, and asked him what a cupid was.  
  
\----  
  
The first letter was found in the kitchen and addressed to Meirin, who had shrieked, dropped several breakable things, fallen over twice, and finally convinced Bard to open it, which he did with the air of someone handling a bomb. It was a love poem, evidently, and it expounded on Meirin’s beauty and cleverness in iambic pentameter. Where it had been signed, the name was hastily scratched out. She kept it on her bedside table and reread it whenever she thought no one was looking.  
  
Lizzie found the next one under her plate, and turned as pink as the bows in her hair, while the young master glowered. This one was a sonnet as well, and compared her to the stars and the ever-shining sun, signed, ‘Your Admirer’. While she was a little put out that it hadn’t been from the young master, she kept it close on hand through the entire day, tied with a glittery pink ribbon.  
  
Paula was found fifteen minutes later giggling over a three-part explanation of why a kind-hearted girl was more valuable than gold and gemstones, and sweeter than a whole assortment of cakes and pastries. When pressed, she showed it to her mistress and the two of giggled together in a way that the demon supposed was common among young women.  
  
Finny found the next one tied to a sapling in the garden. It was a fair deal shorter, and written in plainer script that he had no trouble reading. ‘Yours Truly’ called him clever and brave and cool, and Finny bounded about with renewed gusto, much to the amusement of the other servants. He didn’t even care about the inkblots on the page, and told anyone who would listen that he had gotten his first letter.  
  
The young master’s letter was waiting for him in his room, and was three pages long. Two of the pages were a convoluted metaphor about dragons and chess, which made him smirk and almost smile to himself. The last page was slightly more coherent, though it included a callback to climbing up a castle wall. It had no signature at all. The demon pretended not to see it get filed with important business paperwork.  
  
Bard had a letter of his own, and was studiously ignoring it. When he almost lit it on fire, though, he nearly broke a window getting it to safety. It was a series of quite possibly the worst limericks the demon had ever encountered, but it made him laugh for a good five minutes before Finny wandered over to ask what was the matter and hastily shoved it up his sleeve.  
  
He didn’t see Snake’s letter. Despite this, he was assured by way of Oscar and Emily that it had been greatly appreciated. That would have to do, he supposed. At least the boy was interacting with others more willingly now.  
  
The demon was only mildly miffed to be the last of the household to receive a letter. It obviously didn’t matter in the slightest. Agni waved at him from a doorway, clutching two letters.  
  
“Look, my friend! One for each of us!” He convinced himself he didn’t care either way, and certainly didn’t wonder if Agni had taken pity on him and personally penned the admittedly endearing ramble about the soul of a person who protected others. He wasn’t such a person, of course, but some lies were pleasant to read.  
  
\-----  
  
The next day, Meirin almost fell down the stairs, dropping a basket full of similar letters, and the demon gave up any hope of not celebrating the damn holiday. Somehow, there were pink hearts on the wall that morning too.

**Author's Note:**

> There are a few ways the series can go from here, and it seems like you guys are reading (and enjoying?) it, so I'll put it to you: do you want more vaguely romance-y nonsense, more gen/friendship silliness, or more plot-related stuff? It'd be neat if you commented with your preferences. 
> 
> xoxo  
> M


End file.
